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A22
WEDNESDAY,
NOVEMBER 18,
2015
• Twitter: @GuardianTT • Web: guardian.co.tt
A product of Guardian Media Ltd
Contact us
Editor-in-Chief, Orin Gordon---
orin.gordon@guardian.co.tt
Editor,
Irving Ward---
irving.ward@guardian.co.tt
Chief Editor---Business, Anthony Wilson---
anthony.wilson@guardian.co.tt
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robert.alonzo@guardian.co.tt
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darren.bahaw@guardian.co.tt
Sports Editor, Valentino Singh---
valentino.singh@guardian.co.tt
Email the Editor: letters@guardian.co.tt
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Last Friday's deadly attacks on Paris
have reignited calls for the activation of
Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty
under which NATO was established.
That article states: "The parties agree
that an armed attack against one or
more of them in Europe or North
America shall be considered an attack
against them all, and consequently they
agree that, if such an armed attack
occurs, each of them, in exercise of the
right of individual or collective self-
defence recognised by Article 51 of the
Charter of the United Nations, will assist
the party or parties so attacked."
Only one country in the 28-nation
alliance has ever activated Article 5.
That was the United States after the
9/11 attacks in 2001.
On Sunday, France launched air
strikes on Syria, arguing that it is the
Islamic State (ISIS) group's de facto
capital.
Experts in international law have
explained that if France wishes to have
NATO's Article 5 activated it would need
to call for an Article 4 consultation,
which would result in the ambassadors
of the 28 nations convening in Brussels.
Last year, after ISIS attacked Turkey,
that country made a similar request.
The question, though, that seems to
have stumped some people is whether
any country can lawfully engage ISIS in
military action. Technically, ISIS is not
regarded as a State.
It's difficult to counter the argument
that NATO cannot pretend that this
conflict does not affect its most basic
interests. NATO, it is further argued,
should demonstrate that it is willing to
act decisively when it is under threat.
However, while it is still not clear
under international law whether the
attacks on Paris justify a full-scale war
on ISIS, the international community
cannot ignore the fact that it needs to
unite to prevent ISIS from shedding
more blood across the world.---Jamaica
Observer
Sound Off: Under threat, NATO must act decisively
The police investigation into
the activities of the Educa-
tion Facilities Company
Limited (EFCL) was triggered by
the discovery last week that
employees were believed to be
doctoring documents and back-
dating contracts, creating a facto-
ry for forged documents to claim
state funds.
This raises further concern in
an organisation which owes legit-
imate contractors large sums of
money for actual work done and
which may not have been partic-
ularly diligent in levying penalties
for breaches of contractual obli-
gations.
On taking office in 2010 as
Minister of Education, Dr Tim
Gopeesingh noted that there were
major concerns at the EFCL,
noting that after an expenditure
of $2 billion, only four primary
schools and 18 Early Childhood
Care and Education Centres had
been completed.
Contractors have been com-
plaining about the tardiness of
the company s payment practices
since 2012, when contractors
were still waiting to be paid for
work done for the opening of the
school term in September 2010.
Beyond that is the evidence of
years of poor performance at the
EFCL, resulting in schools open-
ing late in the new school term
because work was either not
completed on time or done so
shoddily that it left the schools
in an unusable state.
By May 2012, Chairman Ronald
Phillip and two other board
members resigned their appoint-
ments but the company contin-
ued its practice of stonewalling
requests for information.
A year later, the Public
Accounts (Enterprises) Committee
made clear its displeasure with
the EFCL s unwillingness to
deliver requested documents and
when it did so, offered a docu-
ment of such volume that the
responses were effectively buried
in minutiae.
It also notably failed to respond
to direct questions from the
PAEC regarding its tender rules
and fraud policy.
There are currently 13 schools
which are under repair and refur-
bishment by the EFCL which
remain closed as a result of laps-
es in project management.
Those problems were given a
troubling face on Monday when
students of Arouca Government
Primary School staged a protest
outside the school compound to
protest a lack of action by the
EFCL on major electrical prob-
lems that have left the school
closed for a month because of a
major electrical problem and now
looks set to stay that way until
next year. The primary school
needs a full rewiring, according
to a T&TEC evaluation.
The EFCL is a special purpose
state company, one of several
created to execute projects with
greater speed and efficiency than
is perceived to be possible within
the confines of the public sector
bureaucracy, yet the lubrication
that seems to be applied in such
agencies far too often in such
cases leads to slippage in both
standards and accountability.
In his contribution to the
budget debate in October, Educa-
tion Minister Anthony Garcia
promised an audit into the oper-
ations of the schools mainte-
nance company, the second after
one undertaken in 2012.
Things may take time to get
done in the public sector, but
those checks and balances exist
for a reason and the EFCL should
have been subject to more ener-
getic efforts at demonstrating
both transparency in execution
and a more robust sense of
responsibility to its access to
public money.
At the very least, the apparent
inability of the company to per-
form its assigned duty, to keep
public schools in excellent condi-
tion, should have triggered offi-
cial concern and investigation
long before now.
EFCL investigation overdue
Things may take time to get done in the public sector, but those checks and balances
exist for a reason and the EFCL should have been subject to more energetic efforts at
demonstrating both transparency in execution and a more robust sense of
responsibility to its access to public money.